


Fading

by PursueCrazyLife



Category: The Walking Dead (TV)
Genre: Aaron is really down in this one, Angst, Bittersweet Ending, Depression, Emotional Hurt/Comfort, Eric being the awesome boyfriend he is, M/M, Sad Fluff
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-01-24
Updated: 2017-01-24
Packaged: 2018-09-19 06:04:17
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,968
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/9421790
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/PursueCrazyLife/pseuds/PursueCrazyLife
Summary: Following Negan's attack Aaron finds it harder and harder to deal with what has happened





	

**Author's Note:**

> I think we can all agree that Aaron has been becoming more and more depressed in season 7, and I wanted to explore this further. Timewise this is set in the future after they defeated Negan. 
> 
> Warning: Deals with depression and suicidal thoughts, if this triggers you read at your own risk.

Eric had always been there. Smiling at him, brightening up his day. Making sure everything was alright. Whenever he doubted himself, or the guilt became too much to carry Eric already waited at the bottom. Taking him by the hand. Leading him to bed. They wouldn't talk. Just lay there. Aaron would feel the warm hand run through his curls. Eric's steady breathing, and his soft voice. Promising everything would be okay. Everything would be alright.

Even as his world broke one person still cared. Even when he himself held the gun tighter, and longer in his hand. Finger curling around the trigger. When he didn't care about his own life anymore Eric did. He had always been there.

 

Doing something helped. When Aaron did something the nothingness wouldn't come crashing in. So he kept moving, kept active, kept his mind occupied. Doing whatever he could not to remember.

All the people he had lost. People he loved were gone. Forever gone. He would, for a few precious moments, learn to smile again, to make a joke, to be happy. But these moments past, and he would remember.

Images and sounds in his head pulling him further and further away from reality. Inside him it was dark. He could make them all believe everything was alright. He could fake a smile, a joke, a carefree conversation. Make them all think he's okay. Tell them he's just tiered. Who wasn't? And most of the time he didn't even have to do that. Everyone was struggling, but there was nothing they could do about it. No magic pill to make the pain go away. It hadn't worked before roamers destroyed their civilization. Why should it work now?

The only thing making him happy was the thought, no the certainty, he would still feel like this even if nothing would have happened. Before walkers had even existed there had been days when he closed all the curtains. Laid down in bed, and stared to the ceiling. His mind spinning. His body exhausted. Sleep even further away than happiness. In these moments he felt trapped. Trapped in his own mind. And no way out. He would have to wait. Hope that after a few hours he'd feel normal again.

Now it felt like he was caught in this state forever. Just existing, but only half of him existing the other half gone. An empty shell. Either terrified, or feeling nothing at all. Sadness so great it started to physically hurt. Making him unable to do anything.

He tried, for Eric, he tried. Tried to crack a smile, or hug him. Talk about something when they sat in silence at the table. When Eric hugged him it felt like Eric hugged someone else, and Aaron just a person watching a movie, a movie that was his life.

It felt like he was behind a massive wall. Eric, and everyone else on the other side. It felt like being buried alive, and no one heard him screaming. The person muffling his screams himself. He couldn't tell them. Because they couldn't help him either. So he distanced himself. Losing himself more and more into the dark void luring behind every corner.

 

When Daryl and Aaron would stand at the gate, gazing into the night, guns in hand they wouldn't talk like they used to. In the faint shimmer of the moonlight Aaron could see Daryl's eyes fixed on him in worry whenever Daryl thought Aaron wasn't noticing.

One night Daryl finally asked. “Are you okay?”

“Nothing is ever going to be okay anymore”, Aaron muttered, panic taking him. Drowning out Daryl's talking. The hopelessness of this all spread out in front of him like a map. Filled with every wrong decision he had made. Each decision bringing them closer to hell. In former times he would feel burning anger at himself. Now he was too tiered. Now he would curl down somewhere. Close his eyes, and hear his thoughts spin in his head.

He had given up hope of ever sleeping again. Sometimes he dropped off, just to be awoken by a nightmare. Everything tasting like blood.

Eric sitting next to him. “You screamed in your sleep.”

Waking up didn't make him feel better. His nightmares weren't images of a fear-fueled worst-case scenario. His nightmares were memories. They were real.

 

Sometimes he would stand outside Rick's house gazing into the rooms. Seeing Rick carry his daughter. Kiss her forehead and smile, sometimes he would even laugh. Michonne a hand on his shoulder, kissing him. Again it felt like Aaron was watching a scene in the movie. All this wasn't real.

How could they still be so normal? Why couldn't he just snap out of it? Rick had lost his wife, Daryl his brother, Maggie had to watch her own husband being killed in front of her eyes. And even she carried on. Even she was capable of feeling happy. He still had Eric. Why couldn't he feel happy?

“Aaron?”

A hand on his shoulder. He needed a few moments to connect the face with a name, and with the name identify who this person was.

She frowned, “Aaron, are you okay?”

He slowly nodded, couldn't tear his eyes away from Rick. The slamming of the bat, the crunching of the bones etched into his mind forever. Always coming back when he looked at them. Rick, someone he had trusted, someone he had looked up to, who knew a solution to most things. Rick had been crying. The sickening feeling a child has when it sees its parents cry for the first time still haunted Aaron.

And all the others crying, shaking with fear. He always saw these memories when looking at them. Maybe he should make new memories with them, but he couldn't. They were static now. The never-ending loop playing again and again. It was okay with Tara because she hadn't been there. He could talk with her without having the memory of her wailing interfering with her speech.

“I'm fine”, he managed to say. Every word feeling like a ton on his tongue. Once he had loved to talk, now it exhausted him.

“You don't need to lie to me”, Tara said, “Eric's worried about you.”

The guilt pulled him down further. He sat down on the steps of Rick's house. From far away he could hear Rick laugh, and Judith babble. Michonne fussing over the small girl. Surreal. They were celebrating life. He hating it more and more by the minute.

“He doesn't need to worry”, his voice sounding different, as if someone had swapped his vocal cords.

“We are all worried.”

“I'll make it up to him”, amidst the black mud in his soul, all the guilt and fear mixed with numbness, he didn't want to hurt Eric even more than he already had.

“What do you mean?”, Tara asked softly.

“He tries to make me happy. Small things. He found chocolate and shared with me, and I used to love chocolate...but now I can't even taste the flavor. It's all gone. And Eric was disappointed.” He remembered how Eric's smile had died down as Aaron swallowed the last of the supposed treat. Trying to smile back at him, but he couldn't.

Something so unimportant bothered him. Because more and more small unimportant things he'd loved started to fade away. Eric had found the last missing license plate. A moment they had both been anticipating for months now had finally arrived, and all Aaron could feel was guilt. Trying to match his own mood to Eric's. Trying to feel excited, but he couldn't care less. What were these license plates anyway? Behind each license plate a car owner, now dead.

He couldn't read anymore. The letters starting to dance on the pages, and his mind showing him the cruel memories again and again when he was trying to concentrate on the story. Everything he did a chore. The fear that someday he would lose interest in everything. He wouldn't love anything anymore. Only the memory left, like a gravestone, of how much he had once loved life. Worse even the thought that haunted him day and night. One day he wouldn't love Eric anymore.

“We are worried, but not disappointed. Why should we be disappointed?”, Tara asked.

“Because you all go on with life, and I can't.”

“You are going on with your life. The very fact you're sitting here next to me is you dealing with life.”

“I can't do this anymore”, he whispered.

“Even if you don't care about your life anymore, even if you think you'll never feel happy again don't forget the people you care about. Just one person who would be heartbroken if you died. We owe it to them.”

“Eric would be better of without me”, he remembered every wrong decision in his life. Davison, the Wolves, attacking Negan's outpost. More and more wrong decisions all leading to deaths. Blood on his hands.

“Denise is dead. My girlfriend is dead. I would give anything to see her again”, Tara's voice trembled, but in her eyes a strength Aaron hadn't noticed before, “You have your boyfriend right here. Use this precious time you have with him. Hold him close in your arms. Because sooner or later he is going to die. And if he dies you don't want to have any regrets.”

She stood up, taking his hand. Together they headed towards Eric's and Aaron's house. Aaron spotted him standing on the porch. Rushing towards them, but halting a few feet away. “Thanks, Tara.”

“If you need anything let me know”, with that she left them alone.

 

Aaron didn't know what to say. Looking away not bearing to see the worry on Eric's eyes.

“Can I hug you?”, Eric asked cautiously.

He didn't know if he wanted anyone to hug him. Or to talk to him. Panic starting to well up again. Making him want to flee from everything. But he couldn't bring himself to say no.

He nodded. Eric hugged him tightly. “Come on inside I made you some tea.”

He followed him into the kitchen. Sitting down on one of the chairs. The cup still felt warm to his touch.

“Are you hungry?”, Eric asked brightly.

Tears welled up in his eyes as he saw Eric doing his very best to cheer him up. Sitting next to him Eric stretched his hand out wanting to touch Aaron's, but at the very last moment he pulled away again.

“Daryl wanted to go on a hunt tomorrow. Asked if we wanted to accompany him. Would you like to go? It'll be fun”, he smiled.

Tears started dripping down Aaron's face.

“Did I... “, again the worried look on Eric's face. Aaron buried his head in his hands. “Hey, Aaron...what's the matter”, he felt Eric's hand on his. “Talk to me.”

“I can't be happy...and you are trying your best...and I can't be what you want me to be”, Aaron sobbed, kicking the table leg.

“You don't have to be happy. After all you've been through you don't need to be happy.”

He looked up at his boyfriend, “No?”

“No, I just want to know that you're safe, and I don't have to worry about you.”

“You'll always worry when I'm not happy.”

“I meant that I know you're with me, and not God knows where. I want you to trust me enough to tell me what's bothering you.”

Aaron shook his head, “You don't need that kind of...of stuff.”

“Yes, I need it. Because you are the love of my life, and I can't bare to see you break in front of them like this. Without me having any way to help. If you at least tell me what's going on I can listen. I can help a bit.” Aaron nodded, the panic had stopped raising. Kept at bay, at least for now.

“Let's get to bed”, Eric said.

“Why?”, a change of location wouldn't help them. He could never outrun his thoughts.

“It calmed you down in the past”, Eric said. Waiting patiently until Aaron rose from his chair. He remembered the countless times Eric had stayed with him in bed. Talking a calm voice pulling him out of his own darkness.

“It's different now”, Aaron finally said.

“We can still give it a try. And it'll be more comfortable.”

“We don't even have a bed”, he muttered following Eric towards their bedroom. Sheets on the floor.

 

They laid down, facing each other. Amidst all the chaos Eric's eyes had remained the same. Not just the color, but the way he could see Eric in these eyes. The essence of his boyfriend being there. Aaron didn't recognize his own eyes in the mirror. They had started to take on a dead quality. Like the eyes of a walker, soulless.

“Talk to me”, Eric said. His brain swirling hard with thoughts, memories, feelings. Everything all at once.

“I don't know where to start.”

“How are you feeling? Don't tell me you're fine.”

“I feel like I'm not here anymore. As if Negan killed me that day. Now everything's fading.”

Eric laid his fingertips on Aaron's bare arm. “Do you feel that?”

“Yes.”

“If you can still feel my touch you're still here.” He nodded, not sure how he could describe this emptiness, but also the fear battling inside of him.

“I have to ask you something. And please tell me the truth”, Eric said, “You won't kill yourself?” The hand tightening on his arm.

Aaron shook his head, “I'm too scared. Can you imagine after everything we've been through I'm still scared of dying?”

The bat pointed at him. An entirety of fear that he would be the one. Would it have been better if he had died? At least then Maggie's child would have had a father, and Abraham could protect the group far better than he himself. He was useless.

“What are you thinking about right now?”, Eric asked cautiously.

“About...”, he didn't want to talk about it. It would feel even more real. Then he couldn't keep on pretending it all happened to another person. He shook his head. Turning his gaze towards the window.

“You can talk to me about what happened with Negan. If you want to”, he noticed how carefully Eric was choosing his words.

“I deserved it not Glenn or Abraham”, he finally said.

“Nobody deserved to die from our group that night”, Eric softly said. Tracing his fingers on Aaron's shirt.

“I have blood on my hands. People died because of me.” Again and again this thought repeated itself in his mind. How many times had Eric told him it wasn't Aaron's fault. How many times had they discussed this, but it never went away. Just getting worse as it accumulated in his mind.

“I would have been heartbroken if you had died that night. You know that, Aaron, don't you?”

“I know, but I didn't come back really, did I?”

“You're still my Aaron. It's normal that you're feeling like this considering what happened.”

“The others are fine.”

Eric shook his head, “Everybody deals with it differently. That's all.” Aaron didn't have the energy to argue.

“Don't let this define you, Aaron. Of course you will be changed, but you will still be you. Not your fears, your thoughts, or your memories. But Aaron, with all your personality traits, your quirks, your flaws. Everything that makes you is still here inside you”, he tapped on his chest.

Aaron didn't think he was still there inside. Something inside him had broken that night. It had been breaking piece by piece, but he had pulled himself together. Carried on, but slowly he had reached the end of his rope. Nothing would be the same again. An irreversible process. Again Negan's voice in his head. The nursery rhyme echoing loudly in his thoughts. Would it ever stop?

“Aaron?”, Eric gently cupped his face, “Look at me. Concentrate on me”, and he tried. He tried to look in the familiar brown eyes. See the small specks in the iris he had grown accustomed to.

“I won't lie to you, and tell you everything is going to turn out right”, Eric softly said. “But for now, in this moment we are safe. We're together, and I love you.”

He wanted to tell Eric he loved him as well, but the words stuck between his head and mouth. As if in this mental state he was in, there was no place for love. Even if deep down he could still feel love for Eric, but it seemed blocked with every other negative emotion he possessed.

“You don't have to pretend to be happy, Aaron. I just want you to be here with me. In this moment, and not somewhere else in your head. Can you concentrate on me?”

It was hard to pull himself out of the darkness. Trying to block his racing thoughts. Eric pulled him closer, and started to run his hand on Aaron's back.

“Concentrate on me”, he whispered. And Aaron did. He concentrated on how Eric's warm body lay next to his, how his hand ran imaginary patterns on his back. How he breathed steadily. The well-known scent of him. The material of Eric's shirt feeling familiar against Aaron's fingertips.

And gradually his mind slowed. He clutched Eric's shirt, and felt better, a little bit better. Eric the anchor grounding him in the here and now. How long this would last? Aaron didn't know.

But it didn't matter because he was here now in this very moment. With the one person who mattered to him the most. For now he was starting to move closer to being better. He would never be okay, but better.

**Author's Note:**

> This was unnecessarily sad *hugs all of the readers*
> 
> Feel free to leave a Kudos, drop a line, or swing by my blog pursuecrazylife.tumblr.com  
> Thank you so much for reading.


End file.
